David Ellefson Says Fans Are Tired of His Fight with Dave Mustaine
Former Megadeth bassist David Ellefson—who swears he’s over his firing from Megadeth despite talking about it more than his current band’s new record—says that fans are tired of watching him argue with Dave Mustaine. Why? Because, according to the bassist, they’re our “fucking heroes.”
Speaking to Brazilian publication KZG, Ellefson said that it doesn’t bother him to talk about Mustaine and Megadeth.
“It doesn’t. It really doesn’t. I mean, look, I spent almost 40 years — well, this year is 40 years, coming up in June, is 40 years of when Dave [Mustaine] and I started the band. If I’m gonna disrespect that, then that’s to disrespect me. That’s to say what a loser I am, what a dumb thing I did. ‘You’re an idiot, David.’ And I’m not an idiot. It was an awesome thing. Now, was it challenging? Yeah. Did it have its hardships? Of course it did. But it also, obviously, had its big successes.
He compared the strained Mustaine/Ellefson relationship to members of Kiss arguing and ultimately referred to Mustaine as his friend, despite evidence to the contrary.
“I’m sad when I see Paul Stanley and Ace Frehley [of KISS] arguing, or whatever is going on. It’s, like, these are my heroes. And we’re all grown men now, so it’s a different kind of thing. But they’re still my heroes. And I even think about that with our fans. It’s, like, they don’t wanna see us fighting. We’re their fucking heroes, man. We changed their lives. We wrote songs that got them through good and bad times. So that’s why I don’t wanna go talk smack. I’ve had interviewers who have wanted to go there with me. I try not to take the bait. I’ve turned down some big interviews with people who wanted to address that. And I’m, like, ‘Me and Dave aren’t talking about it, so neither should you.’
“My friend Dave, despite our differences and the things we’ve gone through, we’ve been friends through better or worse — it’s like a marriage; for better or worse. And even though you may not be talking and you may not be hanging out together now, the truth of it is we did something that was just… Basically, it was like we were astronauts who went to the moon, man.”
